When Unique Holland space out to get a contemporary robot for vineyard, orchard and arena of skills chop growers, the engineers alive to on customers’ top challenges. The consequence? The contemporary R4 robot sequence.
R4 robots are designed to care for primarily the most time-ingesting initiatives that don’t require human-level intelligence. In self-discipline trials, R4 robots reduced labour requirements for inter-row mowing, tillage and spraying by as much as 80%.
“Self sustaining spraying, soil work and mowing were prioritized because growers cited these as time-ingesting, repetitive and advanced to workers,” said Thierry Le Briquer, Unique Holland Grape, Olive & Espresso Product Supervisor. “The R4 became as soon as created particularly to steal over repetitive initiatives so human labour is also refocused on increased-tag work.”
R4 Robots: Designed by and for Growers
Unique Holland engineers extensively integrated feedback from growers when creating the robots’ capabilities, dimension, weight and traction. R4 robots are designed for each and each elephantine and slender row [AB1] widths and steep terrain. They may be able to within the reduction of or minimise soil compaction and succor growers overcome small skilled labour resources.
The machines even comprise a bi-directional mode for mowing, optimized with rear LIDAR to defend a ways from crushing vegetation sooner than mulching.
Moreover, the R4 sequence capabilities an superior observe undercarriage and an equalizer bar. These ingredients allow the robot to assemble exceptionally tight headland turns and present simplest-in-class manouverability. in headlands
Built for Compatibility
“Growers requested alternatives that can no longer require an fully contemporary fleet, so R4 works with genuine implements and even upgrades them intelligently,” Le Briquer said. “Our Wise Put in force ecosystem can retrofit original sprayers to robotically alter drift, top, boundaries, canopy gaps and future location spray.”
The R4 robot sequence uses the same self sustaining tech stack and ingredients as other Unique Holland platforms.
“It fits valid into our elephantine product offering, sharing programs much like FieldOps,” said Le Briquer. The hardware and utility are extremely versatile, easy to toughen and designed for scalability.”
R4 Robots Pork up Efficiency, Security and Sustainability
Unique Holland’s R4 robots speak a aggregate of GPS, LIDAR and vision cameras to navigate their atmosphere. A single supervisor can remotely space up one or extra R4 robots by technique of an app, which helps decrease safety risks connected to chemical exposure and high-depth work.
All-Electrical for Vineyards, Hybrid Vitality for Orchards
The R4 sequence will open with two devices. Both toughen environmental compliance and emissions reduction because as they’ll walk in 100% electric mode and designate primarily the most of a 0-oil put in force design. Implements are powered by electricity or mechanical PTO and lift out no longer require hydraulic oil.
The R4 Electrical is designed for prime-fracture slender vineyards. This fully-electric machine is powered by a 40kWh battery pack that affords approximately eight working hours of walk time, hoping on the electric energy required by the hooked up put in force.. The one tonne machine is a mere 1.38m gigantic and zero.7 metres wide, so it’ll with out peril work in 1-1.5 metre chop spacing.
The R4 Hybrid Vitality is designed for orchards, fruit producers[LF2] and wider vineyards. It weighs 1400kg and has double the energy-to-weight ratio of an typical tractor and the rear hitch can steal as much as 500 kg utilizing linear electric motors.
The 59hp diesel engine is like minded with HVO (hydrotreated vegetable oil) to within the reduction of emissions.A mechanical 540rpm/25kW [LF3] PTO with lustrous progressive clutching works with genuine implements, and a 48V/12kW e-PTO socket can energy future electrically-pushed machines.
The R4 Hybrid Vitality is 1.2m wide and optimised for row spacings of 1.5m and above. Its double-pass functionality enables the machine to operate successfully in elephantine orchards with out misses.
Decrease TCO for Faster ROI
Le Briquer said the R4 affords a decrease total tag of possession (TCO) in comparison with original decisions. Relying on the vineyard kind, growers can demand to put 10% and 22% per hectare.
The worth financial savings is predicated mostly on having a single employee supervise one or extra robots in comparison with having a real tractor operator. A single R4 robot can quilt approximately 25 hectares over the serious four-month seasonal window.
In precise-world vineyard and orchard stipulations, R4 reduced labour requirements as much as 80% for definite initiatives, including inter-row mowing, tillage and spraying — including computerized on/off at canopy gaps, headlands and top-primarily based mostly adjustments.
Preview R4 Robots at GOFAR’s Toulouse Tour Cease, February 2026
The R4 Series isn’t on hand for aquire yet, but growers can assemble a sneak preview at GOFAR’s World Tour Cease in France on 5 February 2026. The free event, that can happen at the Agrobiopôle location in Auzeville-Tolosane, is open to farmers, manufacturers, distributors, investors and agricultural R&D stakeholders.
The event is free, but advance registration is required. For your entire programme or to register, please yell about with gofar-tour.com.
Connected Command
Self sustaining R4 Robotic Series Designed to Answer Specialty Prick Farming Challenges
发布者：Julia C. Keller School of Science，转转请注明出处：https://robotalks.cn/r4-vineyards-and-orchard-robots-reduce-labour-for-mowing-tillage-and-spraying-by-up-to-80/
